All Innovation Darkrooms Urgently Seek A Discerning Leadership

Unintended consequences from innovation’s blind spots cry for sacrosanct duty of care

Innovations are to man what an effective pounce on prey is to a lion, they quantum leap us into a hitherto impossible future with ease. They improve the quality of the lives we lead and increasingly grow our confidence to utilize resources at our disposal. Behind every innovation comes the exciting reward phase marked by huge incomes for the innovators—or perhaps, whatever other non-monetary reward. This often gets us moving on so swiftly that we forget several important things including those that are meant for society's greater good. It must never come to that.

Let us first get acquainted with the definitions of the word "innovation," so that we can truly appreciate it for what it is or not, and the leader's duty in it.

Dr. Ken Hudson of drkenhudson.com shares ten (10) variations of the meaning as defined by different people below. I include them all here for a reason that I will share shortly.
 

With these clarity-bringing definitions, we now can better appreciate the blind spots in line with the subtopics that follow. Please note that none of the ten (10) definitions above or from elsewhere when you search widely, adds: ".......without causing new problems......" to them, hence our quest to sensitize you about the said blind spots. Innovation leadership must exercise the duty of care.

The act of harnessing clean water from mountains, rivers, and underground sources via pipes, was literally and figuratively a ground-breaking innovation with far-reaching benefits for mankind. It instantly saved us time in manhours and effort around physically fetching water meant for whichever of its many uses, besides, it handed us the dignity that for eons had lacked in open-air river bathing—a real sense of privacy. Man was now freed to focus on more important things having done away with a mundane time waster—it quickly caused hitherto unthinkable settlements to sprout and flourish beyond wild imagination—and as a consequence, we now have huge cities around the world.

The Romans gifted us this innovation, and 'Plumbing'—anglicised from the root word 'Plumus' in Latin, meaning the metal, lead, was born, for the original pipes were made of lead—(Pb).

But, widely held belief, though debatable, has it that it was these lead pipes that eventually brought down the Roman Empire. Studies suggest that lead poison-related illnesses associated with stunted brain growth in children took their toll on the population, as it silently claimed many victims over a long period. For the Roman expansionists, it suppressed the progressively incrementally-developed thinking capacity needed to stay ahead in empire-building and robbed them of thousands of potential soldiers, engineers, medics, et al. And gradually, many roads stopped leading to mighty Rome.

So, one tedious problem comprehensively solved by man, birthed an unlikely health-related monster. And the innocent masses bore the brunt of the unintended consequences occasioned by their partaking in contaminated water. And it all began like this:

A bulb lit up in the innovator's mind, the leader was convinced of its great importance in advancing the empire's might and civilization, and the project was actualized with limited input from the all-inclusive community of experts. That bulb fatally dimmed the empire’s prospects.

In recent years, a repeat of the Roman experience occurred in the United States. The Flint water crisis of 2014—2019, affected the residents of Flint City, Michigan.
Authorities hurriedly switched water sources, with the great innovation here being the well-intended cost savings initiative of the new management. But they failed to add corrosion inhibitors alongside other safety measures.

The water got contaminated with the lead leaching from the aging pipework, thus exposing as many as 100,000 residents to the dangers of lead poisoning. Besides this peril, the new water source had previously served as an industrial waste dumpsite to many manufacturing plants. No wonder the discoloured water had a foul smell and a flat taste. Residents complained of rashes and hair loss amongst other ailments. The water was not fit for human use.

This goes to show that all innovations however simple, ought to be checked and tested for public safety reasons. All piping material must undergo mandatory checks including testing for dangers introduced by wear and tear. Where necessary, public participation must be embraced. The urgency brought about by elective politics and the power therein, steer us into these dangerous blind spots, and we must beware lest we bear the brunt for no direct fault of ours. Responsible leadership makes a huge difference.

Devastating events tag along with them useful innovations meant to mitigate their causes.

Sample these. The global economic meltdown of 2008 triggered by ‘creative financial modelling’, the various terrorist attacks around the world—911 included, and the Covid -19 pandemic. They were all more unanticipated than unprecedented events.

More of unanticipated because the sequence of progressive steps leading to their D-days, easily slipped through early warning systems and escaped everybody's watchful attention.

And somewhat unprecedented because past occurrences of comparable events, never prepared anyone enough for the inconveniences now remedied through the urgent creation, and need to embrace disruption-alleviating technological innovations, in all facets of our lives. Such capabilities to produce modern technology-dependent solutions were inexistent earlier.

At the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, besides deaths, planes remained grounded and the movement of passengers and essential goods was disrupted in ways that caused much harm to people, organizations, and countries alike.

The 2008 economic meltdown rendered many people jobless, homeless, and ultimately, hopeless.

The terror attacks across the world have killed innocent people and destroyed dreams and property.

But ironically, in the aftermath of such moments emerge improvisations that help us overcome the short-term effects, as the dependable cutting-edge solutions in the longer term are still in the works.

Covid vaccines got produced and administered in record time—and thankfully, a lot has improved since the earlier doses became available, kudos to the collaborative efforts of scientists the world over. The global financial ecosystem too enforced stricter post-recession laws and conclusively dealt with corporate malpractices such as Enron’s. And over time since 911, security measures in all major places got heightened, seeing now that they are awash with body scanners and sophisticated sensors strategically placed in places designated as security zones.

These innovations have stepped in the gap for us all. But they are not without blemishes. A lot has been written about them on various media platforms and won't add value to our topic by repeating them here, save for the duty of care emphasis as they get continuously improved.

Interestingly, a sneak peek into peacetime innovations reveals that competition is nearly always the driver. The good thing here is that competitors never hesitate to call out harmful innovations. This gets everyone working harder. Therefore, the due process that peacetimes innovations undergo, must apply to emergency times innovations as much as possible. At least we have the testing steps to borrow from. Best practice is a must-have for mankind’s sake.

The catch 22 situation in urgently saving 1,000 people now but causing lifelong harm to 1,000,000 more in the process, must be quickly brought to all the relevant decision-making parties required on the table now, before execution. Else the innovation must be declared and marked as experimental. This way, people get to know exactly what it is they are getting into. The onus of doing that falls squarely on the collective leadership within the particular situation. They must all grace the darkroom together without killing the innovative spirit.

To have a 360-degree view of blind spots, we must appreciate that uncalled-for fear can also cause you to miss the benefits of industry leadership.

Kodak invented the digital camera but management wouldn't hear of it for fear of what it would do to the much-loved film. They never wanted it harmed. In the process, they allowed competition to nourish the belittled monster that eventually had Kodak for lunch. And all because of the inertia from unfounded fears.

Xerox developed the computer, but like Kodak, their love for paper-based copiers blinded them from the enormous potential of the digital world. Word has it that parts of its computer division got offloaded to Microsoft and today, the difference is plain for all to see. It was an expensive offload.

Nokia, the pride of Finland, was miles ahead of competitors in telephony but it religiously stuck to old hardware designs and simple technology. Competitors embraced internet-enabled technologies married to touch screen capabilities, and Nokia found itself gasping in the wake of smaller outfits. It eventually toed a line it never drew, but at much cost in lost market share and accelerated developmental costs.

These three companies perhaps could have done well had they not feared to change their leadership teams when new opportunities beckoned. And just like every generation has its greeting style, the leadership in these companies missed the signals and stuck out like sore thumbs. A true moment here to use the maxim: “if you don't change, then change shall have you changed”. The leadership became the blind spots.

There is yet another lot of innovators worth mentioning. They develop impressive products for their employers, have them launched with much aplomb and an eye-catching event designed for the attention of competitors who then quickly seek them out. And off they go to repeat their magic. But the new product's blind spots come to full bloom inside a different financial year when the innovators have earned bonuses and promotions, and are long gone. The leadership now finds itself helpless.

 Let’s not get too engrossed in the heat of the moment's razzmatazz that we fail to do a comprehensive review of new products' successes and failures before mimicking them from across the fence. You just might succeed in copy-pasting sugar-coated failure. Or, perhaps internally, you lack the winning culture needed for the product’s success. That responsibility to forestall such losses again is squarely in the ambit of the leader.

Now that we know that the danger in innovations lies in the pitch darkness of their unprecedented nature, it now is easier for us to manage the blind spots that come in situations that lack histories of documented experiences. If we do not inspect, then we must never expect.

Creative success or failure can emerge from or lurk in innovation blind spots. It is the leadership that must step in, decipher, decide and declare the way to prosperity albeit, without any loss of enthusiasm for the duty of care, lest they get sued or booted by stakeholders. If you fail society, it will flail you unreservedly.

Additional reading can be found in the books: The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire—Life and Death of the Republic by Barry Linton, The Fall of the Roman Empire by Peter J Heather. These additional links are beneficial to the keen reader: